bank holidays! especially looking forward this long 4 day weekend we have coming… after the last few weeks of stressful work days I am SOOO ready to have nothing planned for four days except for spending each morning in a yoga workshop. hopefully the weather gods will decide to change their mind about the predicted rain this weekend, i could use a few days outside in the sunshine. maybe a bicycle ride? or two? or preparing my tiny little front yard garden?

Found these on my computer from random pictures I took last year on long walks near my home – I think we definitely need to get out and enjoy the beauty I am surrounded by and celebrate the end of winter hibernation!

Some evil person stole my favorite jacket on Saturday night. A jacket i was so happy to be able to wear again as the weather finally defrosted and i could say goodbye to my heavy winter coats. So sad :( Evil thieves. Well at least now i have a more valid excuse to buy a new jacket, and i might have just bought the leather jacket i have been drooling over for the last few weeks. oops. (shhh… dont tell my financial advisor, aka boyfriend)

Seriously bewildered by the Chanel clogs gracing the March cover of Vogue UK on Alexa Chung, that everyone seems to love. Really not feeling them on her or from the Spring 2010 runway show. Am I the crazy one here? Rachel Zoe thinks they are amazing. They just remind me of a $1800 version of something from Wet Seal circa 1995. what do you think?

Being awoken this morning by a stranger ringing our doorbell after far too few hours of sleep I woke up bleary eyed and needing coffee. Andreas woke up and started cleaning our apartment, I was lazy and wanted to lay around…. Although finally I decided I should take advantage of this monumental occasion of having my boyfriend actually begging to clean, sorting laundry, vacuuming… and joined him in a good deep clean of our apartment. Its amazing how dirty the windows must have been because looking out of them now is a whole new world. I think this will be the first time the laundry basket is actually empty. It feels good…. but lets see how long we can keep this up ;)image here

So the music last night was amazing, which was expected… the hour before the music, not so much. Boyfriend is VERY German, meaning he is incredibly organized, good at planning and a bit of a worrier. All of things i am definitely not. Needless to say we are a good match and balance eachother out. So, yesterday I was feeling very prepared for our drive with my printed google maps driving directions right to the venue’s door. We left with ample time, so we would have a extra hour in case we got lost. Two things I do not think I would do without him, as I have a history of being notoriously late and pretty good at getting lost in a car. (on foot i have a great sense of direction, but somehow driving really mixes me up) Apparently the majority of Zurich is under construction so immediately my printed directions failed us :( after driving for a bit, i decided to turn on the data roaming on my phone which is SO expensive once you cross the border. Finally we were back on track with a little guidance from my faithful iphone and found parking and were there right on time. We found the street the venue (Schiffbau) was supposed to be on and the address i had for concert hall was an office building which was closed. fail. :( we turned the corner and found a theatre with the name Schiffbau “oh this must be it” we go to the ticket counter to make sure and the woman looks at us with that look of “you idiot” and said the place we were looking for was on the other side of the city and we could take a tram #4 there. Our hearts dropped a little, we marched down the hill to where the tram was and i googled the venue to find out where in the world (or Zurich) this place was. The website said, a short walk from the central train station. ” oh great we will get out at the station and walk.” so we did. i googled again and realized we were off the tram 4 stops early, a good 30+ min walk and by this time we were very late. Back on the tram once more and a bit more walking after an hour of hunting we finally found this giant concert hall named Schiffbau. Really? 2 places in the city with the same name? Well the music was incredible, we even got there with enough time to drink a beer and get a place in the very front of the hall. I just love how humble a musician he is, or atleast he seems to be. Not really any commentary, just a hello, goodbye, thank you and beautiful music, pretty much exactly like the last two times i saw him in San Francisco. The night turned out lovely- but i think we are finally going to break down and buy a GPS for the car and I am going to try not to think about the roaming charges on my phone i definitely will pay a hefty price for next month. It was worth it, and definitely an adventure which is what makes like interesting, right?

We’re off to Zurich for the night to see one of my all-time favorites Jose Gonzalez and to hear some beautiful music. Hopefully we can walk around the city a little bit and explore and take some pictures. I have never really been to Switzerland before, technically I have been in the country twice… once was in Austria where we snowboarded to the Swiss side of the mountain and the other time was in the Basel-Mulhouse airport which lies on the French-Swiss border and we walked across the border to our gate. There is a cafe at the airport on the border and on one side you pay in Swiss Francs and the other side in Euros and you need to go through immigration to cross the border, I thought it was hiliarious.

Anyway, I am dying to see some live music as sadly we don’t get a whole lot of good music coming through these parts…

Last week I organized a surprise box to come from California with some goodies for Andreas, as i am still trying to make up for the sweater mishap. The sweater mishap involved me shrinking one of his favorite wool sweaters in the washing machine ( i swear i put it on cold! ) and since now it fits me perfectly- one might think i did it on purpose…. but definitely not the case. Still feeling guilty, obviously I’m not that great at laundry and hoping this might get me out of laundry duty for a while….

Yesterday was the first real spring day we had this year so far, the evening was warm and just begging for a picnic. I raced home after a long day at work, picked up some sandwiches and told Andreas to meet me at the little park down the street which i intend on making our dinner spot during the sweltering summer months. It was a lovely evening and got me really excited for the warm days and nights to come. And daylight savings! cannot wait for the sun to stay out later lots more time for picnics :) but of course after a gorgeous sunny week, the weekend is supposed to rainy :( Mama also sneaked in the last two US vogues in the box as a surprise for me so i am pouring over those tonight, oh how i love fashion, and any english magazine i can get my hands on.

Chasing Heartbeats is the visual journal from photographer Ashley Ludaescher, a California girl living in Berlin, Germany. This blog features snippets from life in Berlin, travels around Europe, and Heartbeats- inspirations and somewhat magical moments in everyday life.